I'd wrestle him any day.
I bet you are wondering how we ended up here.
I grew up avoiding wrestling because wrestling was gay and I was no fag, or so I thought.
I played everything else. Football, basketball, baseball, soccer, and when I was not playing I was training by running, hiking, swimming, and lifting once Dad let me at fourteen. But never wrestling.
Then I went to college. My best sport had always been football, but I was too short and too small for a D1 team, or so I thought. Turns out I was just focused on the wrong sport.
I applied to the Athletic and Fitness SIG Dorm anyway, figuring it would be cool to hang out with the athletes, maybe lift with them in the off season. When I met my roommate we clicked. He instantly felt like a brother. He was a wrestler, a four-time state champion, an Ironman finalist, a Super 32 placer, a two-time Fargo All-American, and somehow still the kind of guy who would give you the shirt off his back and drag you to morning lifts with that stupid grin that made you believe he could pull you into his world.
Turns out he could.
It started with sneaking me into the athletic department’s training room so I could lift with him. Then he began taking me into the wrestling room and having me help him run drills and practice techniques. Every training session left me exhausted. He pushed me past my limits and then made sure I recovered so I could do it all again the next day.
This went on for a few weeks until we got caught.
That day started just like every other. Up early but not too early, so we could sneak into the training room after the football lift but before anyone who would know I wasn’t on a team showed up. Then off to the wrestling room for another round of drills and abuse.
But this session was interrupted by a booming voice from the doorway that froze us both. The coach demanded to know why Davidson had brought a non wrestler into his wrestling room. Brian muttered something about our schedules and how I was good enough to learn some basics. The coach made it clear that whatever Brian had been doing to me was not basics and that he was amazed I wasn’t passed out. He reminded Brian that only team members and staff were allowed inside.
What happened next still does not feel real.
He turned to me with a stare that went right through me and asked my name. When I managed to give it he broke into this calm, wicked smile. He thanked Brian for getting their latest recruit up to speed and said I was now Brian’s practice partner unless I did not want to join the team and get access to the facility and tutors.
It was clear I did not really have a choice.
I stood there like a deer in headlights until Brian nudged me. I tried to explain that I had enjoyed training with him but had never wrestled a day in my life. The coach was already walking off when he told Brian that was his problem and that the first official practice was in three weeks. He expected Brian to make sure I did not embarrass him, the team, or myself.
The next thing I knew Brian grabbed my leg and took me down, laughing about how much he had to teach me, on and off the mat.
So here we are at my first practice. After that day we kept the same schedule, but Brian took more time to explain what things were called and how to apply the skills, we even started to spar, Brian still regularly pined me. Brian bought me this singlet and insisted I wear it. I thought no one else would, but it turns out it is a tradition here, train like you compete.
And yes, Brian had a lot to teach me about wrestling and life. When you spend every waking moment together you find things out.
Turns out he was into me as much as I was into him, not that I knew it then, not until that night, but that is a story for another time.
